Daoud Sediqi, the former host of "Afghan Star" and once labeled Afghanistan's most famous person, has left his home country to live in the United States, where he is working for Voice of America. At a recent event in Berlin, Sediqi was full of praise for Afghanistan and the "brave people" still there, but it was clear that he had fled the country because of the country's worsening security.

"All Afghans want peace and want to rebuild Afghanistan," he said at an event of the German Council on Foreign Relations. "But even with all the money and the soldiers from the West, no one can find a way."

In early 2005, things looked encouraging.

A democratically elected government was in place, the Taliban had been driven away, and ordinary Afghans were full of optimism, eager to lead a normal life, eager to express themselves. "Afghan Star" proved the perfect outlet for that.

Created by Sediqi and a young crew at Tolo TV, the show featured a group of male and female singers competing to become the next superstar of Afghanistan, where music and singing was outlawed only nine years ago.

The show unearths the same talent as its bigger brother in the United States: Many can't sing, but some do so admirably.

What's different in Afghanistan is the speed and vigor with which the show took the nation: People buy Sim cards in droves to vote via SMS for their favorite contestants, girls have posters of their favorite candidate above their bed, and a Pashtun sings arm in arm with a Tajik -- in a country ravaged by decades of internal ethnic strife. For young Afghans, pop music isn't just a diversion; it's a symbol for a modern and more hopeful future.

Havana Marking, a London-based filmmaker, followed Sediqi and four contestants of the show's 2007 installment in her documentary "Afghan Star," which has been submitted as the British candidate for the 2010 Oscars in the foreign films category.

At the show's peak in 2006 and 2007, when a third of the country tuned in, an ecstatic Sediqi tells the camera, "I'm not afraid of the Taliban. I want to say the Taliban are finished."

But Sediqi was wrong: Starting in late 2006 Afghan security began to deteriorate, and the Taliban made an unexpected yet forceful comeback.

The show's contestants started to feel this when one of them, Setara from Herat, knowing that she had been voted off the show in her final appearance, broke into an emotional dance on stage, almost losing her headscarf.

For Setara, the dance was an act of freedom and emotion; for the religious elite and the Taliban, it was blasphemy. It sparked a Fatwa from the local warlord Ismail Kahn as well as many death threats from extremists.

"She brought shame to the Herati people. She deserved to be killed," said an anonymous young man in an interview on the streets in Herat. Even one of her fellow contestants showed that he isn't ready to accept this.

"In her last song, she showed her hair and danced a lot. She will pay a big price," he said.

Setara finished fourth and is still alive despite the threats. "Afghan Star" is still playing, but there are fewer contestants and they are not as brave when it comes to pushing the envelope.

"We need time … young people are under pressure from the Taliban, but they will change," Sediqi said, trying to sound upbeat. But he couldn't hide the frustration over security in his country, where some 110,000 foreign troops don't seem to be able to crush a few thousand Taliban insurgents.

Sediqi hopes that the young people can turn his country around. The chances for that are not too bad: More than 60 percent of Afghans are under 21.

That means the fate of Afghanistan is in the hands of those who adored Rafi, the show's pretty-faced winner, and cheered for Setara, who braved the Taliban to dance on stage.

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